One of my favorite Twin Cities foodie moments happened last night at the Guthrie Theatre. This week Minneapolis was host to the annual National Cooperative Business Association conference. Colleagues who are cooperative leaders from the across country were in town for this conference. Thanks to the Wedge Co-op we were treated to an evening reception up on the 9th Floor of the Guthrie overlooking the river and the Stone Arch Bridge with spectacular views.
So to the food…. The Wedge put together “A Taste of the Twin Cities” and this is what I enjoyed:
At the very first tasting station I had an amazing salad served by Brenda Langton (of Spoonriver) herself. (No cheating on my vegan-whole grain month here!) Salads can be a little boring sometimes, but this one was not even a little boring.
Some cheating came into play at the next tasting station. Danny Schwartzman of Common Roots Café was serving a small elegant appetizer which included the tiniest but most tender and tasty piece of Thousand Hills Beef topped with an amazing sauce. I am not huge on beef, but this was amazing. I had three of these by the end of the evening. Would have probably had more, but I was too embarrassed to go back for more. Danny brought along the rancher from Thousand Hills Beef to greet the crowd in person.
The French Meadow Café had a station I believe with a chicken-based tapa, but I skipped it as I had already cheated with the beef.
Then I walked over to the Gardens of Eagan tasting station I was happy to see Linda Halley, the farm manager at GOE, serving up the food herself. GOE had a sweet potato and cranberry side as well as a kale dish. I love my kale, so I atoned for the beef cheat by having plenty of kale. The table was full of gorgeous colors – red, orange and bright green.
Now I turned the corner to more tasting stations and here is where I fell into more cheating…
French Meadow Bakery teamed up with Rochdale Farms to serve bread and cheese. Rochdale was there serving an amazing assortment of their cheeses – and I absolutely could not say no to their luscious creamy blue cheese crumbled onto some whole grain bread. YUM. (At the end of the night French Meadow passed out the extra loaves for folks to take home, so we will also be enjoying a big loaf of multigrain here at home.) I didn’t have a lot of cheese (blue goes a long way!), but there you have it – my first dairy product in nearly three weeks.
So far along this food journey I had the tiniest portions of beef and a little blue cheese, and lots of luscious local veggies. Not so bad… but then came the dessert table. My downfall. The Wedge’s pastry chef put together a huge assortment of desserts. I suppose there is no excusing maple syrup crème brulee, but I ate the whole thing with no regrets. Then there was the lemon meringue tart. I skipped the shortbread crust, but thoroughly enjoyed the eggy lemon filling and meringue topping. And finally there was the chocolate truffle cake. I shared this with a colleague and had a few tasty bites.
I am still committed to a month of a vegan (meat free, dairy free) diet with plenty of whole grains and limiting salt, sugar and caffeine. But I had to fall off the wagon a little for this event!
So to the food…. The Wedge put together “A Taste of the Twin Cities” and this is what I enjoyed:
At the very first tasting station I had an amazing salad served by Brenda Langton (of Spoonriver) herself. (No cheating on my vegan-whole grain month here!) Salads can be a little boring sometimes, but this one was not even a little boring.
Some cheating came into play at the next tasting station. Danny Schwartzman of Common Roots Café was serving a small elegant appetizer which included the tiniest but most tender and tasty piece of Thousand Hills Beef topped with an amazing sauce. I am not huge on beef, but this was amazing. I had three of these by the end of the evening. Would have probably had more, but I was too embarrassed to go back for more. Danny brought along the rancher from Thousand Hills Beef to greet the crowd in person.
The French Meadow Café had a station I believe with a chicken-based tapa, but I skipped it as I had already cheated with the beef.
Then I walked over to the Gardens of Eagan tasting station I was happy to see Linda Halley, the farm manager at GOE, serving up the food herself. GOE had a sweet potato and cranberry side as well as a kale dish. I love my kale, so I atoned for the beef cheat by having plenty of kale. The table was full of gorgeous colors – red, orange and bright green.
Now I turned the corner to more tasting stations and here is where I fell into more cheating…
French Meadow Bakery teamed up with Rochdale Farms to serve bread and cheese. Rochdale was there serving an amazing assortment of their cheeses – and I absolutely could not say no to their luscious creamy blue cheese crumbled onto some whole grain bread. YUM. (At the end of the night French Meadow passed out the extra loaves for folks to take home, so we will also be enjoying a big loaf of multigrain here at home.) I didn’t have a lot of cheese (blue goes a long way!), but there you have it – my first dairy product in nearly three weeks.
So far along this food journey I had the tiniest portions of beef and a little blue cheese, and lots of luscious local veggies. Not so bad… but then came the dessert table. My downfall. The Wedge’s pastry chef put together a huge assortment of desserts. I suppose there is no excusing maple syrup crème brulee, but I ate the whole thing with no regrets. Then there was the lemon meringue tart. I skipped the shortbread crust, but thoroughly enjoyed the eggy lemon filling and meringue topping. And finally there was the chocolate truffle cake. I shared this with a colleague and had a few tasty bites.
I am still committed to a month of a vegan (meat free, dairy free) diet with plenty of whole grains and limiting salt, sugar and caffeine. But I had to fall off the wagon a little for this event!
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